1. Beetween
   Between
2. Beteen
   Betwayne

A tipoff to this word's meaning is the "tw" part, also seen in "two" and "twice." It suggests that two points, destinations or ideas is at play, with the subject of the sentence not directly at either one. "Betwixt" is an old-fashioned word meaning the same thing.

1. Describe
   Descrybe
2. Descreib
   Dezcrybe

The root word here is "scribe," which is a word unto itself, meaning a person who writes things down. Well, it was in the old days. Now, we use a variety of terms for this, including "stenographer" or "note taker."

1. Irly
   Urly
2. Early
   Urrly

How we wish it was as easy to learn to always be early as it is to learn to spell "early"! This word is related to the now mostly archaic "ere," meaning "before." You'll see "ere I go ..." in several plays by Shakespeare.

1. A facet
   A facked
2. A fackt
   A fact

Just four little letters, but it can be fairly difficult for young children to learn. Need to Know Dept: The first choice, "facet," is a word. It means "an aspect," or, in jewelry, a feature of how a gem was cut.

1. Crooked
   Crooket
2. Crukked
   Kruiked

Though the spelling here is simple, the pronunciation of this word can be a difficult one for kids to learn. "Crooked" looks like one-syllable words like "cooked" or "looked," but is pronounced with two syllables, in the style of earlier English pronunciation. (When you read poetry or Shakespeare, you'll notice that words like "armed" are pronounced "arm-ED," which makes the line meter work out).

1. Truble
   Trubble
2. Trouble
   Troble

"Trouble" is something that all elementary school students know about. "Ooh, you're gonna be in trouble!" is a common refrain on the playground. It's a close second to the perennial "I'm telling!"

1. A veil
   A veyl
2. A vaal
   A vale

This word is covered by the mnemonic rhyme "i before e, except after c, and when pronounced as 'ay,' like in 'neighbor' and 'weigh.' " It's the last part of that rhyme, obviously, which applies here.

1. Always
   Allways
2. All ways
   Aulways

This word is a shortening and a simplifying of "all ways," meaning that something happens "in every occasion" or "every circumstance." That is, "The fire extinguisher should always be in its wall bracket in the kitchen."

1. Esplain
   Esplane
2. Explain
   Eksplain

This frequently used word requires an "x," not a "ks" or a "cs" or other ways to make this sound. You might hear "esplain" as a mispronunciation by a speaker of one of the other Romance languages, like Spanish or Italian.

1. Sandwetch
   Sandwich
2. Sandwitch
   Zandwetch

Children who are exposed to ghost stories and fairy tales often have trouble with this one, choosing the spelling "sandwitch." Fun fact: The lunch item is named for the Earl of Sandwich, supposedly the first person to think of putting meat between two slices of bread. (We kind of suspect peasants were doing this long before that, but didn't get credit because nobody paid attention to what the poor folks were doing).

1. Murderr
   Murter
2. Murder
   Mordor

Too serious a topic for grammar-school students to deal with? Maybe. But hey, in Christian schools in comes up quite early, when students are taught the Biblical story of Cain and Abel. They might as well spell it right.

1. Monkies
   Monkeys
2. Monkees
   Monnkeys

Yes, the official name for a group of monkeys is called a "troop." This question highlights a certain amount of confusion among children learning to spell about "y" words being pluralized: Usually, the "y" changes to an "ie."

1. Garvity
   Gravity
2. Gravitty
   Gravidy

Gravity is one of the four essential forces in the universe. The others are the strong nuclear force, the weak nuclear force and electromagnetism. We'd explain further, but we don't really understand these concepts. Can we get credit just for spelling them correctly?

1. Grait
   Grate
2. Great
   Grayet

This is an important one for young students to get down pat. They often spell this "grate," but, of course, that's a different word. It means a protective cover, usually of metal, which allows the passage of air, water or tiny objects, but keeps larger objects out.

1. Silos
   Siloes
2. Syloes
   Psilos

The English language can be very confusing, more so for adult English learners than for children born in English-speaking countries. The plural of "tomato" is "tomatoes," and "domino" is "dominoes," adding an "e." But not so with "silos" or "dynamos." Why? It's just how a complex language grew, with plenty of exceptions to its rules.

1. General
   Generall
2. Jeneral
   Jenneral

Of course, it's more common for us to use this word in it's adjective form, in which it has nothing to do with the military. In that sense, it refers to something broad or widely shared: "There was a general sense of relief."

1. Mistery
   Mystery
2. Misstery
   Miztery

This word has a sophisticated spelling; it's rare for "y" to be used more than once as a vowel in the same word. However, we suspect that kids learn this one fairly young, because of the preponderance of mystery books — e.g. "Nancy Drew" — aimed at children.

1. Securr
   Secur
2. Sekure
   Secure

Fun fact: Delete two letters from this word, and you'll get a close synonym, "sure." These two words don't mean exactly the same thing, though: "Secure" often implies physical safety, whereas "sure" means something can be counted on.

1. Preetend
   Pretende
2. Pretend
   Pretent

Kids should learn early how to spell this one correctly — playing games of "pretend" is a common activity in childhood. This word is related to "pretense" and "pretentious," words that will come up in vocabulary lists later.

1. Lenth
   Leenth
2. Length
   Longth

This one can be tricky for kids and English-language learners. Some regional accents render the "g" silent, making it "lenth." It helps to remember that the root word is "long."

1. Relait
   Reelait
2. Relate
   Relaet

"Relate" is one of those words which people use very frequently, but can be wickedly hard to define. Well, in some cases, it's not, such as when it simply means "tell": "He related a charming anecdote." But in the instance of "I relate well to teenagers," the definition is both broad and subtle, hence our somewhat clunky definition above.

1. A brige
   A bridge
2. A brij
   A brege

This is a basic word kids will be using a lot in life. In addition to something that crosses a river or ravine, a "bridge" has a musical meaning (it's part of a song that transitions back to the original melody) and one in dental medicine: It's a structure containing more than one prosthetic tooth.

1. Union
   Yunion
2. Younion
   Onion

Students will be learning about this one fairly early. The United States of America is sometimes poetically called "the Union," at least, as a concept or political entity, not necessarily as a geographical place. The word comes up most often in studies of the Civil War.

1. Fineance
   Finance
2. Phynance
   Phynants

Granted, in grammar school, you don't really need to know about "high finance." In the early grades, it's all about milk money! Even so, it doesn't hurt to know how to spell the word.

1. Athleat
   Athlete
2. Athalete
   Athleete

If you chose "athalete," perhaps you grew up watching WWE wrestling. Longtime announcer Jim "JR" Ross was constantly referring to wrestlers, in an Oklahoman accent, as a tremendous or amazing "athalete."

1. Feline
   Feeline
2. Felyne
   Pheeline

This word comes from the Latin "feles," which meant the same thing, "cat". As in English, it can mean a wild cat or a domestic one. Despite the similarity, it doesn't seem to be any relation to the Latin word "felix," for "happy."

1. Unesone
   Unisone
2. Unison
   Younison

Don't confuse this with "Unisom," the brand name of an over-the-counter sleep aid. "Unison" comes into play most often when describing speech; people say things "in unison." But we suppose there are other uses: a line of can-can dancers is kicking in unison, for example.

1. Ninty
   Ninety
2. Nindy
   Neintie

This one should be simple, right? The single-digit number is "nine," which uses a final "e" to derive its long-i sound. So the "e" should be there in ninety, right? But start paying attention, and you'll notice how many people write this one "ninty."

1. Mote
   Moat
2. Moet
   Moot

This is another word that's probably familiar to children thanks to fairy tales. The first choice, "mote," is also a real word, meaning "small speck." You'll find this one in the gospels, where Jesus tells a questioner to "remove the board from your own eye before you remove the mote from your brother's." (Question: Can someone really get a whole board in their eye? We suspect this is a translation issue).

1. Gage
   Gauge
2. Gayge
   Gaige

Actually, it's not just temperature or pressure that might be measured by this. Merriam-Webster's site (our go-to for word-and-language questions) defines this word simply and broadly as "an instrument for measuring and testing."

1. Icecles
   Icicles
2. Isicles
   Iscycles

This is a commonly misspelled word, thanks to its dropping of the "e" from "ice," and of the soft "c" being pronounced like an "s." Sidenote: "Iscycles" gets our vote for a new name for those fat-tired bicycles that can be ridden in winter conditions.

1. Snoweflake
   Snowflaik
2. Snow flake
   Snowflake

Making a compound word into two individual words is still considered a spelling error, even though both words might be spelled correctly. It's more common for older people to make this mistake, as they might have learned it that way: In English, words morph from two words to hyphenated to a single word, no hyphen.

1. Wave
   Waive
2. Waif
   All of these

Yup, all three of these are correct spellings of words with different meaning. "Wave" is something you do with your hand; "waive" means to allow the bending of breaking of a rule, and a "waif" is an orphan or a slight, fragile person (usually female).

1. Council
   Councel
2. Cowncel
   Counsel

Good advice is commonly called "wise counsel." This term has also morphed into a word for a lawyer or a team of lawyers (it can be singular or plural), as in, "Please approach the bench, counsel."

1. Caesar
   Ceasar
2. Ceaser
   Ceisar

New rule: We think that on the first day of culinary school, all students should be rounded up and this spelling pounded into their heads. For good measure, writing it correctly should be a graduation requirement. It clearly isn't now -- just look at any chalkboard with the day's specials, or even some permanent, laminated menus, and you'll see a mangled spelling.